EAST STROUDSBURG -- The mountain's oldest football rivalry is taking center stage Friday night as Stroudsburg and East Stroudsburg South meet for the 80th Battle for the Little Brown Jug. But this year, it's not just the coveted trophy that's on the line.
With the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference split into three divisions this year, only the Pocono schools are in the EPC North. The Cavaliers and Mounties are the last undefeated teams in the division, meaning Friday's victor will essentially clinch the 2024 division title.
"Our boys understand the job at hand," South head coach Matt Walters said. "So you're adding a little brown jug and an EPC championship against your rival for the 96th overall time and the 80th Jug game. Our kids are fired up for the opportunity."
The Cavaliers won the Jug in 2023 in a 40-7 thumping en route to an undefeated October and a district playoff berth. Most of the key contributors are back this season, but Walters doesn't believe any of his players are thinking about that.
"I don't think last year's game is in any of our guys' memories," Walters said. "They're focused on the task at hand, and that's winning an EPC North championship. When you're playing a team like this with the rivalry, you could throw the records out the window, you could throw last year's meeting out the window. It's going to come down to execution on Friday."
Stroudsburg played poorly on the offensive side of the ball in the last Jug game, an uncharacteristic performance considering the Mounties averaged 35.75 points per game against the rest of the mountain in 2023. It was a loss that Jim Miller and his team had to sit with for over a year.
Now the returning Mounties and the head coach have a chance to redeem themselves at Ed Christian Memorial Stadium, on the very field where they lost the Jug.
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"I think going into that game last year, I don't think they took them very seriously. Number two, going into that game, it was more emotional right off the bat, you know, and our guys sort of got sucked up in all the emotion," Miller said. "So this year, the two biggest things are going there, play our game and don't get sucked up into any of the emotional stuff, and just do what we do every Friday night. You know, it's just, it's, it's another game."
Additionally, the Jug game will pit the two best offenses against each other: South averages 41.25 PPG, while Stroudsburg averages 27.6 PPG. Both schools have a balanced offense but lean more toward the passing game and their big-play receivers.
Xzavier Pusateri is in contention for the EPC Triple Crown, as the South wideout is less than 150 receiving yards away from 1,000 this season. And while Kamari Coleman isn't the only receiver the Mounties have, he is Stroudsburg's top target who can execute an explosive play at any time. It's possible fans could see a direct competition as both players play defensive back along with wide receiver, so while the offenses are duking it out, whoever wins the matchup between Coleman and Pusateri could give his team the deciding edge.
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Stroudsburg also has to account for the other two members of the three-headed monster: quarterback Ivan Laubach, who's thrown for 1,360 yards and ran for 335, and Charles Capers, who should be on the shortlist for conference Player of the Year with 1,175 rushing yards and 21 touchdowns.
"We gotta stop the run, that's the one thing," Stroudsburg senior Ethan Dudsak said. "After we stop the run, we can focus on everything else. Even if we make a mistake, we have to let it go. We can't let it bring down our momentum. So we have to find any positivity that we can and build on it."
Miller emphasized similar things when it came to facing South's offense, saying that his team has to "have gap integrity up front, stay low and play physical football. If we do those things, you know, we'll be fine. If we don't, it'll be a long night."
But the Cavaliers have their share of challenges, from Coleman and Dudsak at wide receiver to Ben Pilcher and Jackson Mitchell sharing quarterback duties and Jaylin Rieara out of the backfield. Moreover, Walters will be coaching against Stroudsburg offensive coordinator Jake Cirillo, Walters' first quarterback at South who went on to play at East Stroudsburg University.
"It's funny: when you watch the Stroudsburg tape and you see the way that Jake sees the field and calls the offense, it's very similar to how I see the field and how I call my offense," Walters said. "So it's an interesting matchup in that aspect that we know what they're going to do, they know what we're going to do. Their defensive coordinator was my defensive coach when I was here in John Bozena.
"That's what makes this matchup so fun, is that we know what's going to happen, but we just have to play ball on both sides and whatever team can execute better is going to walk away victorious."
South defensive tackle Yael Fernandez gave credit to Stroudsburg's offense, but remained steadfast in the Cavaliers' accomplishing their goals this season.
"Stroudsburg has some guy. They have Kamari who is a dog," Fernandez said. "We just gotta do our best to execute on defense and not let up big plays.
"Being the best team on the mountain means everything to us. This is what we work for. We had two off years, but we finally got a chance to prove everybody wrong, and we're just ready to dominate."
The Cardinals are riding high after winning their first game of the year in thrilling fashion against Pleasant Valley in Week 8. East is already in the district playoffs, with 5A only having four teams, but the program doesn't want to stop at one win under first-year head coach Dustin Thomas. Regardless, if East holds on to the 3-seed, it will face an uncharacteristically down Whitehall team on the road instead of a supercharged East Stroudsburg South offense.
For North, a turnover-filled performance cost the Timberwolves dearly in a 40-7 loss to Stroudsburg, but the playoffs are almost a certainty given the current 4A power rankings. However, seeding is at play as the 7-seed Timberwolves are narrowly separated from the 6-seeded Lehighton Indians. And while it's not likely, it's worth saying 5-seeded Pottsville has a tough two-game stretch to end the season. Should North win either of its last two games, it'll be the first time the program has won four games since the 2016-17 season, according to MaxPreps. Two years before that was the last time the program won five games.
The last two losses should be signs that Pleasant Valley is close to getting that elusive first win of the season. The Bears led North and East late in the game before the opponent produced some late gamer heroics. The young squad has also continued to grow its passing game, showing the ability to consistently complete screen passes to complement its option offense. Pleasant Valley is also playoff-bound in 5A, but would like to enter the postseason without a "0" in the win column.
For West, the goal is to continue developing its young guys while finishing the season on a high note. The Panthers' toughest challenge is behind them after their 49-21 trouncing against South, and they have a chance to pick up another win against an equally young Pleasant Valley team. Fortunately, freshman running back Christian Stiehler has proven to be a building block for a program that returns starting quarterback Jerel Simms and two-way athlete Brady Behr next season.